PCC’s Interview With Documentarian Paul Kendall

By Paul Freeman

Gene Clark is well known for the songs he wrote during his two years with The Byrds. The memorable tunes include "I'll Feel a Whole Lot Better", "She Don't Care About Time", "Set You Free This Time" and "Eight Miles High."

Lesser known, but just as stirring are the masterpieces he wrote over the following years, including “Train Leaves Here This Morning,” “She Darked The Sun,” “Where My Love Lies Asleep,” “Tried So Hard,” and “Silver Raven.” Two of his songs, “Through The Morning, Through The Night” and “Polly,” were covered on the 2007 album “Raising Sand,” by Robert Plant and Alison Krauss.

Clark’s brilliant solo albums, such as “White Light” and “No Other,” failed to achieve commercial success. Collaborations with artists like the Gosdin Brothers, Bernie Leadon and Doug Dillard pioneered the country-rock genre, but didn’t receive their rightful recognition.

Visually striking, the magnetic Clark was blessed with a gorgeous singing voice and a gift for combining literate, intriguing, poignant lyrics with moving, haunting melodies.

But the enigmatic artist, burdened by substance abuse, often sabotaged his own career, as when he punched music mogul David Geffen. Clark died in 1991, at age 46, his genius not fully acknowledged in his lifetime.

Paul Kendall has written and co-directed an enthralling, insightful new documentary, “The Byrd Who Flew Alone: The Triumphs and Tragedy of Gene Clark.”

A couple of Kendall‘s acquaintances had made a fine documentary, “Love Story,” about Arthur Lee and the band Love. When he attended the premiere, Kendall thought, if he could find the right story, it was something he would like to try. Gene Clark had always been one of his favorites and, after reading John Einarson’s biography “Tambourine Man: The Life and Legacy of The Byrds’ Gene Clark,” Kendall knew the singer-songwriter’s life was brimming with drama.

A U.K. music journalist in the 70s, Kendall went into advertising, where he learned about filmmaking. For this documentary, he teamed up with two of his sons, Jack (co-director, editor) and Dan (cinematographer).

They shot over 40 hours of interview footage. They did over 30 original interviews, as well as piecing together vintage audio interviews. Bonus features on the DVD version include rare Clark performances, filmmakers’ commentary and additional, compelling interview segments.

Among the revealing interviewees are Barry McGuire (who was in The New Christy Minstrels with Clark); the other original Byrds, Roger McGuinn, Chris Hillman and David Crosby; Carla Olson, who sang duets with Clark later in his career; and A&M Records co-owner Jerry Moss. Also offering valuable anecdotes are Clark’s brother, sister, sons, former wife, friends and many of the musicians with whom he worked.

The Kendalls, traveling to the U.S, shot great footage of the places where Gene lived and worked. Because his art was influenced by his surroundings, it’s important to get these glimpses of timeless Missouri, frenetic Los Angeles and tranquil Mendocino.

Paul Kendall talked with PCC about the triumphs and tragedy of the fallen Byrd, Gene Clark.

POP CULTURE CLASSICS:
What made you so passionate about Gene’s work that you wanted to devote so much time and effort to the project?

PAUL KENDALL:
I’d always loved Gene Clark’s music, from way back. I first came across him in Dillard & Clark, back in ‘‘68. I followed his music, when I was in my music-writing stint in the 70s, when he was over there with the K.C. Southern Band in ‘77.

Someone bought me the John Einarson book as a gift. It reminded me what a fantastic, compelling story Gene had. I thought, ‘Okay, maybe this is the story I’ve been looking for.’ But I thought surely somebody had done it already. When it didn’t look like anybody had, I took it from there.

PCC:
You met Gene, when he was touring in England, what were your impressions of him at that time?

KENDALL:
They’d come over here to do a series of dates in the U.K., and I’d seen him at the Hammersmith Odeon in London, which is now the Apollo. And then went to one of the cities in the north, either Liverpool or Leeds, to see another gig and to interview Gene. As it turned out, the gig was canceled. The tour was canceled. There were problems with the promoter. So interviewed Gene for about an hour, for a magazine called ZigZag, which was a quite popular magazine in the U.K. at the time.

And, when I finished interviewing him, there was nothing else to do, the gig wasn’t happening, so we just went out and had a few beers into the evening. And I always remembered him, because he was the most unstarlike man, for a guy who was a big star and, in his day, a huge star. Of all the performers I interviewed or hung out with at that time, he was the least starlike of all of them. He was quite a shy man, not really terribly self-confident at all. But I thought he had a real warmth to him. Of all the people I interviewed at that time, there were only two I felt I had connected with on a purely human level. And Gene was one of them. The other was Lowell George of Little Feat. So Gene had made quite an impression on me. And the book filled in a lot of gaps. Gene really had a roller-coaster life, very sad in many ways, but he still produced an extraordinary body of work, despite that.

PCC:
What was it about his music that you found to be so magical?

KENDALL:
A combination of things. I think he had a fantastic sense of melody, a really unique way with lyrics. The word ‘visionary’ is overused these days, by the media. But, in talking to various people about the way he wrote and where he got his inspiration from, I think the word ‘visionary’ can be accurately used in Gene Clark’s case. He got his inspiration from somewhere even he didn’t know about. That’s probably one of the things he struggled with, that he had this extraordinary gift for writing and didn’t know where it came from. His wife, in the film, says, it just came through him. He was almost channeling.

And he struggled with that. Other songwriters, who are kind of craftsmanlike, have a greater understanding of what they are doing. They may be more fortunate, in that they know what they’re working with, whereas people like Gene - he’s not the only one - who have this God-given gift - do often seem to struggle to come to terms with it and be able to deal with it.

PCC:
Having that unique gift, a lasting influence, and some fervent fans, why do you think he’s been so under-appreciated by the general public?

KENDALL:
I think, in a lot of ways, he was his own worst enemy in that. After he left The Byrds, and I think one of the reasons he did leave The Byrds, was that he struggled with the various pressures of stardom and being a leading light in the music world, and thereafter, he seemed to try to avoid that sort of success again. He carried on making fantastic records, but didn’t do anything to actively promote them and try to turn them into the kind of successes other people had and he might well have deserved.

PCC:
In the film, it seems like some friends have contradictory perceptions of whether Gene was totally disinterested in fame or whether he consciously tried to avoid that or whether he was actually seduced by it.

KENDALL:
I don’t think it’s so much that his friends had contradictory views. I think he was contradictory himself. He as conflicted. One part of him, from what we know, one side of him enjoyed the trappings of fame and the material things that it brought, the recognition that it brought. But then there was another side of him that shied away from that, didn’t like it, found it difficult to deal with.

PCC:
Gene’s departure from The Byrds, there’s still so much difference of opinion as to whether it was the result of the pressures or the fear of flying, or the fact that he wanted to go solo.

KENDALL:
I’m not sure we’ll ever get to the bottom of that. The main guys in The Byrds, who probably know better than anybody else, probably aren’t going to spill the beans on that. Certainly when we were interviewing, particularly David Crosby and Roger McGuinn, they kind of toed the party line about the fear of flying. Other people think that’s a bit of a red herring, really. The impression I got from what I’ve read and from what I know from various people, it wasn’t so much a fear of flying that was the problem. It was a fear of what would happen at the other end of the flight. If they were taking a flight on tour, it meant that, when they got off the plane, there would be the pressure of audiences, media people, music business people and expectations. I think that’s what he was probably afraid of, rather than the actual flight.

PCC:
Do you think that’s why, instead of beginning his solo career by making a very Byrds-like record, he goes with the lush, epic “Echoes” single and then his collaborations with Doug Dillard, all very different from The Byrds’ hits?

KENDALL:
I think, in making his music, like many artists, he followed his muse, he followed his instinct. In Gene’s case, he was quite strongly influenced by the people that he worked with at different stages of his career. With Dillard & Clark, obviously, he was working with Doug Dillard, who brought an awful lot to that particular combination, not maybe as much from the compositional point of view, but certainly from the musical influences point of view. And he took Gene into, well, back into, when you consider Gene’s upbringing, back to a more roots, bluegrassy sort of place.

And then later on, when Gene was working with Thomas Jefferson Kaye as his producer, that took him into another place. If it felt right, Gene would go there. And if it stopped feeling right, as with the end of Dillard & Clark, and various other projects, then he would go off and do something else. It was very much a case of him following his instincts, following his muse. I don’t think he did much in a sort of calculated way, certainly not in a career way.

PCC:
Do you think he was aware of how revolutionary it was to bring all the traditional country influence to folk-rock?

KENDALL:
I doubt it. Again, I think that roots music, bluegrass, country music was ingrained in him, he was brought up with that in Missouri. That’s the music his father was doing as Gene was growing up. So that was very much in him. From talking to, particularly, David Clark, his brother, and Bonnie, his sister, he had a fairly - although his childhood wasn’t rich in some respects - it was quite rich in the range of music that he was exposed to, from the down-home country music that his father was playing to the church music to almost classical stuff, obviously hearing a wide range of of things on the radio, Elvis Presley onward. I think all those things just came together in him. And then came out again, without any sort of ambition or planning, in his music. It had been in there and he let it out.

PCC:
You mentioned his brother and sister. There are so many remarkable interviews in your film, with family, friends and peers. How did you get them to be so relaxed and candid, as if they were talking with an old friend in their living room? They really open up.

KENDALL:
I think that came out of necessity to some degree. The whole way we shot it was very low-key, very minimalist. We shot most of it on a month-long trip around America. And it was just me and my two sons in a station wagon, minimal lighting rig, very small cameras. There was no film crew, no people running around with clipboards. No big fuss. We would just turn up. Most of the interviews were done in the people’s own homes, which was what we wanted, so we had them in their own setting. We would just turn up and Jack and Dan would spend maybe half an hour, an hour tops, sorting out where we wanted to actually shoot the interview, setting up the small amount of equipment. And then we’d just sit down and have a chat with whoever it was that we were interviewing.

And I think that helped enormously, the fact that it as so low-key, so unpressured. There weren’t people all over the place, plugging in wires and taking notes. The experienced interviewees, the David Crosbys, the Roger McGuinns, the Chris Hillmans, were kind of disarmed by it. And certainly the people like his brother and sister and the various friends who weren’t used to being in front of the camera, it helped them feel comfortable. I’ve done a lot of interviews, over the years, for various projects. And I always try to make it sort of a dialogue, rather than a question-and-answer. I’m trying to establish a rapport with the person I’m interviewing. And that makes it more relaxed. And all that worked well for us. A number of people have commented on the quality of the interviews. That’s one of the things that helped to make the film what it is.

PCC:
Were you surprised by any of the material you got from The Byrds?

KENDALL:
The Byrd that I was pleasantly surprised by was Chris Hillman. I was warned by a couple of people who’d interviewed him over the years that he can be a bit prickly, if you get him on the wrong day. But he was great, very relaxed, very happy to talk. And I think he comes across fantastically well in the film. He obviously cared about Gene and appreciated his talent was almost kind of frustrated that Gene - I’m reluctant to say didn’t make the most of his talent, because in one respect, he made a fantastic amount of his talent. He left a great legacy of music. But he didn’t achieve the depth of recognition that he probably deserved.

PCC:
Chris has said that he doesn’t understand why Gram Parsons has become such a cult figure, while Gene tends to be less discussed.

KENDALL:
Well, I think Gram Parsons sort of helped himself by living fast, dying young and leaving a beautiful corpse. Gene lived long enough to have 10 years of obscurity, pretty much, before he actually passed away. I’m a great fan of Gram Parsons. He’s wonderful. But if you compare the two bodies of work, I think you’d have to say that Gene’s is probably the stronger. And if you look at the chronology, Gram Parsons may be referred to as the father of country-rock, but Gene Clark’s first solo record was ahead of what Gram Parsons was doing.

PCC:
Hillman’s fondness for Gene comes across. And Crosby and Hillman seem to have a lot of respect for him. So all the tensions among The Byrds, do you think that came out of the strong egos? Jealousies?

KENDALL:
As Crosby says in the film, these were five young guys who literally went from scrapping around for money for hamburgers one minute to being number one all ‘round the world. That puts stresses and strains on you. And clearly, that was a band that had several strong personalities. So I guess the seeds of conflict were there right from the get-go. It’s difficult for any combination of personalities to survive for long, when they’re under the pressures and strains of those sorts of circumstances.

PCC:
The success of The Byrds, do you think that was both a blessing and a curse for Gene Clark?

KENDALL:
Yes, I think you’d have to say it was. Obviously it was a blessing in the sense that it put him into the spotlight and the royalty checks that he got from it sustained him for a number of years after he’d left the band, particularly in the Mendocino years, when he was making the ‘White Light’ album and ‘No Other.’ I get the impression, from talking to Carlie (Gene’s ex-wife) that he was able to have that lifestyle in Mendocino, doing that great work, because he was still getting some pretty decent money from his time in The Byrds. So it was a blessing.

But, on the other hand, it was obviously something that, as Ken Mansfield (a friend from Gene’s Laurel Canyon years) says in the film, it was something that Gene never really managed to extricate himself from. Forever after, he was an ex-Byrd. And, particularly because he wasn’t able to achieve any really significant commercial success in his own right, it was as tag he would be stuck with for the rest of his days.

PCC:
Did you find it sad that he did end up forming various incarnations of The Byrds in his later years, because that was the only way he could survive?

KENDALL:
Oh, I don’t see how you could possibly say anything but that, the fact that he was forced to fall back on that in order to keep himself together and to make a living, yeah, it is sad. He was worthy of better.

PCC:
What did you conclude was at the heart of his self-sabotage and self-destruction? Was this something he was born with? Or a result of his inability to deal with the circumstances of fame?

KENDALL:
I’m not a psychologist, so I hesitate to hazard an opinion. But I do think it was a combination of both. From what we know of his family background, clearly, there are patterns of issues running through, cropping up. But, of course, the life he led, the way that went, the stresses and strains, that can’t have helped. As his sister Bonnie said in the film, had he made a living as a musician, but at a much lower, less pressurized level, then he may well have had a longer, happier life. But it’s often the way with great artists that, in order for us to enjoy the art they produced, they had to lead the lives that they led.

PCC:
Do you think, if Gene hadn’t been such a tortured soul, we might not have had such poetic, powerful writing from him? And that wonderfully mournful sound?

KENDALL:
Yeah, I think almost certainly not. I think it’s unreasonable to expect, in any sphere, not only music, to expect extraordinary work to be produced by ordinary people. It doesn’t work that way.

PCC:
It seems like even with all the friends and fans, and he was married for several years, there was a deep-seated loneliness in him. Did you sense that?

KENDALL:
Yeah. I was talking to Sid Griffin, of The Long Ryders, who knew Gene, and I told him we were calling the film, “The Byrd That Flew Alone.” He said, “That’s right. Gene could be alone in a crowded room. He was perhaps the loneliest man I’ve ever met.” So you’re absolutely right.

PCC:
What do you believe to be Gene’s primary legacy or lasting influence?

His music lives on. And most of it still sounds as fresh today as when it was first made. There was a kind of supergroup of Americana artists recently put together by Beach House [including members of Fleet Foxes, Grizzly Bear and The Walkmen, plus Iain Matthews], doing a tour, reproducing Gene’s “No Other” album. And it created a stir. The audience, as you might expect, with those bands involved, was 90 percent quite young, probably a lot of whom had never heard of Gene Clark. But apparently the reception was fantastic. If you look on YouTube, there are some performances there. So Gene’s music still has the power to attract new listeners.

PCC:
Are you hoping that the film, as well, will bring new listeners into his music?

KENDALL:
That was absolutely the hope for the film. It was one of the primary motivations for making the film. Gene should have been treated better, in terms of his role in music history. This was a labour of love and attempt to right that wrong, to get him a bit more of the recognition that he so richly deserves. It we can do that, then, mission accomplished.

PCC:
Has Gene’s family let you know how they feel about the completed film?

KENDALL:
We hope everyone likes it. But we particularly wanted Gene’s family and nearest and dearest to feel that we’d done him justice and had done a good job. And, yeah, we’ve heard that they’re very happy with it. They feel it’s a very fair reflection, an honest, balanced view of the man and his story. They feel we’ve done right by him, which is just what we’d hoped to do.

To view clips from the film and to order a DVD, visit foursunsproductions.com.